


Natural Selection

by wintergrey



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Banter, Cuddling & Snuggling, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Implied/Referenced Sex, Kissing, Multi, OT3, Romance, Sexual Tension, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-09
Updated: 2014-08-09
Packaged: 2018-02-12 09:44:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2105010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wintergrey/pseuds/wintergrey
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p></p><blockquote>
  <p>“This is a S.H.I.E.L.D. initiative. So, I guess it’s just me you have to convince.” Coulson shrugs. “But it’s going to take a lot of convincing if it’s not by the book, Steve. The last thing I want is to—”</p>
  <p>“Spend time and resources on someone, give them a high security clearance, bring them into the inner circle, and then find out they work for Hydra?” Steve can’t keep the snap out of his voice. This has everyone on edge. “Yeah, it crossed my mind, too.”</p>
</blockquote>In the aftermath of Project Insight, after Sam and Steve bring in The Winter Soldier, what remains of S.H.I.E.L.D. manages to finally unravel the mysteries of the super-soldier serum. It falls to Steve to find the first two candidates for testing and he's suddenly faced with one of the biggest decisions of his life: who does he bring into the super-soldier family to double its number from two to four? He knows the answer he wants before he starts but he doesn't want to endanger the people he loves. Natasha isn't worried about herself but she refuses to risk Sam's life. Sam's ready for anything—so long as it makes him better at doing what he was made to do: protect this family he's chosen for himself.
            </blockquote>





	Natural Selection

**Author's Note:**

  * For [circ_bamboo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/circ_bamboo/gifts).



“You have to pick someone.” Coulson is irritated. Coulson is never irritated, not with Steve. “Steve, these guys they’re sending you for this, they’re the best of the best. Or so they say.”

“Yeah, but…”

“I know. You have different standards for ‘best’. If you don’t decide they’re just going to give it to someone. Anyone.” Coulson drops a tablet on the table and, though it’s small, it hits with a sound as heavy as a five-foot stack of dossiers. “This is the last batch, Steve.”

“What if I want someone who’s not in the batch?” Steve doesn’t want to touch it. It’s going to be the same thing as always, a lineup of men who look disturbingly like him, as though that was the standard by which heroes should be judged.

“How not in the batch are we talking?” Coulson crosses his arms over his chest, ruining the line of his suit. He really is irritated.

“Really. Not.” Steve doesn’t even want to say the names, doesn’t want to go there. But he doesn’t know the character of these other people the way he knows the ones who are in his head.

“This is a S.H.I.E.L.D. initiative. So, I guess it’s just me you have to convince.” Coulson shrugs. “But it’s going to take a lot of convincing if it’s not by the book, Steve. The last thing I want is to—”

“Spend time and resources on someone, give them a high security clearance, bring them into the inner circle, and then find out they work for Hydra?” Steve can’t keep the snap out of his voice. This has everyone on edge. “Yeah, it crossed my mind, too.”

“We have the files, it’s not going to be the same,” Coulson says, too defensive to get angry at the reference. “We’ve vetted everyone, cross-referenced.”

“There’s always another file, Coulson. There’s always another layer. It’s Hydra. They didn’t pick that name accidentally. There will always, always be another head, no matter how many you cut off.” Steve picks up the tablet but it’s only to hand it back. “You’ll have my recommendations on your desk by noon tomorrow.”

***

“Spit it out.” Bucky is sprawled on his bed, on the other side of a floor-to-ceiling wall of something that’s more like steel than glass. Steve hates that wall, hates this isolation ward, but Bucky says he prefers it in here. Sun slides in through the skylights to paint a halo around him. “You’re shit at keeping things to yourself.”

“If you’d had the chance, back when we were kids, would you have done what I did?” Steve turns a chair around to straddle it with his arms across the back. “This?” He gestures at himself.

Bucky laughs at him. Not mocking, just outright laughter, like Steve hit some funny bone he didn’t even know Bucky had. Steve hasn’t seen him laugh like that in decades and, no matter how knotted up he is about this, he’s glad to see it.

“What?”

“Would I have become a superhero?” Bucky rolls out of bed to come over to the wall. He hasn’t been that close to Steve, to anyone, since Steve and Sam caught him—or he let them catch him. He leans against the wall and, as much as Steve wants to get up and get close to him, Steve knows to wait. “Are you kidding? I didn’t volunteer for this and I’m pissed as fuck they took my brain. I don’t know how I’m gonna wipe my record clean but I’ve got at least another hundred years to work it out, they tell me. I’m gonna work it out, Steve, and then I’m gonna make the most of this. Why the hell wouldn’t I have done what you did?”

“I don’t know. The isolation. Not being exactly human anymore.” Steve doesn’t like talking about it but it eats at him and Bucky’s the only one he can tell these things to, at least for now. “Living a hundred years and more. Watching the people you love die.”

“Do you think that doesn’t happen every day?” Bucky brings both hands down against the wall so hard that it’s like a gun going off and Steve nearly falls off the chair. Bucky’s eyes are blue fire in the shadows of his too-long hair. “That’s the point, Steve. The world is full of people being made less human, like they did to me, and worse. Loneliness is eating people up from the inside every day. People are watching their kids die when we could stop it. If you regret what you are then I don’t know you.”

“I don’t… I just…” Steve gets up as Bucky turns away from him. The sun glitters in the spiderwebs of cracks left behind where Bucky lashed out. The wall isn’t a wall to keep Bucky in so much as a wall to keep the world out. “I have to pick two other people for it, and—”

“The guy who helped you find me. The red-headed sharpshooter.” Bucky says it like he’s telling Steve the time of day. He throws himself down on his bed, drapes his silver arm over his eyes. “And get someone to fix that wall.”

“Why. Why them?” Steve hates this, hates that he can’t touch Bucky, can’t make it better, and he hates it more now that he knows that it’s the goddamn point.

“Because.” Bucky sits up again to look him in the eyes. “Because they could stop me. They’d do it and not miss a beat, either of them. And because you already decided.” His gaze is so sane now and so steady, Steve doesn’t know how he talked anyone into locking him up. “Trust me. Trust yourself. Or, better, trust them.”

***

“Sam.”

Sam looks up at Nat, who’s upside down. After a moment, he realizes that she’s standing over him, frowning down at him. Then he remembers how he got here.

“You’re not paying attention.” She walks around to offer him a hand up. He takes it. Her hand is tiny but her grip is fierce. “This isn’t us practicing, it’s me beating you up,” she hauls him to his feet. “Which, you know, could be a lot sexier with less clothing involved.”

“Teasing’s just cruel, Romanov.” Sam gives her his best sad face before he tries to throw her—and almost succeeds. She goes down but she takes him with her, even twists to use him as a landing pad. Her sharp elbow gets him in the gut, takes the wind out of him. “Damn. So close,” he wheezes.

“Close? _Close_?” Nat laughs in his face, literally, as she crawls up over him to smack him on the cheek. “We need to talk if you think that was close, Wilson. Close to what?”

“Well, it’s the closest thing I’ve had to a date all year.” Sam takes her hand again so she can haul him up a second time. “You people are terrible for my love life.”

“You don’t need a love life.” Nat smacks him in the belly hard enough to sting even through his sweat-damp T-shirt, adding a little insult to injury. “You have us. What, we’re not hot enough for you?”

“Hot’s not the problem.” That’s about all Sam’s willing to say on the subject. There’s a few problems but none of them are Nat or anyone else not being hot enough. He grabs his water bottle. Too bad it doesn’t do a damn thing for anything other than the mundane kind of thirst.

“Steve’s not straight, if that helps,” Nat says out of the blue, and Sam chokes on his water.

“What?” he gasps between spasms of coughing.

“Or, at least not straight enough to avoid checking out your ass every chance he gets,” she adds helpfully, pounding him on the back. Neither thing is particularly helpful.

“I,” Sam starts to say. “I got nothin’, actually. What the hell?” He sits down on a bench at the side of the abandoned warehouse doubling as the S.H.I.E.L.D. gym these days. At least it’s empty right now.

“Don’t disappoint me, Sam.” Nat puts her hands on her hips. “Don’t be weird about this because I know you—”

“Would ride that like he was a drugstore pony and I had a roll of dimes, yeah, congratulations for working out that I’m breathing.” Sam scowls at her, channeling his embarrassment into irritation so he doesn’t burst into flames from it. “But he? Is not interested in me. You, on the other hand, I think that’s why he carries that shield around all the time, if you know what I mean.”

“Nice try. I know I’m hot.” Nat flops down onto the bench next to him, then steals his water and helps herself. “But he knows who I am. And Steve is into good people, Sam. I am not a good person.”

“Nat—”

“You don’t know, Sam.” She won’t look at him. Her perfect, rosy mouth is pressed into a thin, pale line, the tightness around her eyes says more about her sadness than tears could. Some things are too far gone to cry over.

“People change.” Sam puts an arm around her and pulls her close. Nat doesn’t resist, she melts against him, curling up small and putting her head on his shoulder. He kisses her sweaty hair as though she’s his little sister or something, because it seems like the kind of thing that’s supposed to help. “It takes a special kind of person to change. Me, I just came this way. You’re working for it. Doing better than me turning into one of you hero types, too.”

“You never looked at the files?” She asks quietly, after so long that Sam’s back is cramped from pressing against the cool cinder blocks. He’s in no hurry to move, though. A little pain is worth it if he’s helping a friend.

“Wasn’t important.” Sam didn’t even think of it, he’d been busy helping Steve find Bucky. “Why would I?”

“I don’t know.” Nat pushes away enough to look up at him. “Find out more about the people you decided to throw in with.” He can’t tell if she’s disappointed in him or not. Probably wasn’t very strategic to miss looking all that stuff up before Stark managed to scrub the internet—mostly to get things off there before the government found out enough about itself to make trouble for everyone.

“I know what I need to know. I know people.” Sam shrugged, he didn’t have a better way to explain it. “Maybe it’ll bite me in the ass some day, but for now… it’s been good so far.”

“Even though you haven’t had a date in a year?” Nat gets to her feet easily, as if nothing ever hurts her, not even sitting all cramped up like that after a long workout. “You are a masochist, Wilson.” She offers Sam her hand and, yeah, he needs it. Again. He feels a hundred years old right then, the way his muscles are complaining.

“Some things are more important than dating. Like friends. Friends are way more important.”

“Hot friends.” Nat turns away from him with a little toss of her damp red curls. “Hot friends are everything.”

***

“I need to talk to you.” The text glowing on Natasha’s phone carries a weight she can feel even through the encrypted web of the internet. She hasn’t seen Steve in two weeks.

“Usual place,” she sends back. Sam, she sees at what passes for the gym these days. Maria, she meets up with in a bunker under a parking garage. Fury, she doesn’t see at all. Steve, she sees at this little diner halfway to Westchester. She doesn’t go to S.H.I.E.L.D. facilities if she can help it. She can’t take the knowing in people’s eyes.

Natasha gets there early and drives on past. After a rambling drive through the backroads behind idyllic fields and farms that she doesn’t let herself linger on, she’s back at the diner. Steve’s watching the road between bites of pie, ballcap pulled down low.

“How is it?” She slides into the booth across from him. “Any coconut cream?” Cherry pie might be his style, Sam might love apple, but she’s not one for either. The diner serves all three—sometimes she grabs a piece for Sam once Steve’s gone.

“Good as always.” Steve glances up to give her a little smile that makes the corners of his eyes crinkle frustratingly. “Already ordered for you.”

“You two expecting anyone else?” The waitress slides Natasha’s pie in front of her, then a cup of coffee.

“Just us, thanks.” Steve nods at her and she clears off.

“What’s wrong?” Natasha asks, after washing her first bite of pie down with coffee. “You sounded upset.”

“In a text message?” He pauses with his fork halfway to his mouth.

“I know you.” She shrugs one shoulder, then stabs her pie with her own fork. “So, spill.”

“Coulson’s had me on this thing. They think they have the serum worked out, it looks good, and I—”

“Sam.” Natasha doesn’t let him finish. “Now can I eat my pie?”

“Why Sam?” Apparently not.

Natasha doesn’t want to do Steve’s work for him—not because she doesn’t have anything to say. Because she has too much to say. She could talk all evening about what a good guy Sam is and how good he is at what he does and how solid he is… how good he and Steve are as a team, how the world would be better if Sam were taking care of it. Instead, she has another bite of pie.

“Because he’s Sam,” she says, when it’s obvious Steve isn’t going to let this go without her answering. He puts his fork down and she looks him in the eyes. “You know all the reasons as well as I do. Are you holding off on picking him because you’ve got a thing for him?”

Steve’s eyes widen, then he leans back, pulls off the ball cap, and runs his hand through his hair in a near-universal gesture of discomfort. “Nat—”

“Don’t try fronting with me, Rogers.” The pie is even better with a little Steve-squirming for topping. “You think he’s cute.”

“It’s _Sam_ ,” Steve sputters, like that’s some kind of defence. Natasha just laughs at him for it.

“Whatever.” She rolls her eyes and digs the knife in a little deeper. It’s good to know he’s not just in denial about the whole thing, at least. “You know ‘why Sam’, Steve. Don’t make me do your job just because you don’t want to think about how you might like him a little too much.”

“It’s not…it’s complicated.” Steve shoves the hat back on, which is good because he looks adorable with his hair standing out in all directions like some hero from a Japanese cartoon. “It’s not appropriate.”

“To have a crush on the most crush-worthy human on the planet?” Natasha takes another bite of pie—it really is tasty. “It’s good. It’s good that you feel that way. Means you’re alive.”

“That what you tell yourself?” Steve’s glance is glittering with mischief when he catches her eye.

“Hey.” Natasha takes refuge in the truth. “I appreciate excellence. What can I say?” She’s a better faker than he is, he’s not going to catch her off guard.

“I feel I should be offended, then. I don’t count as excellence?” Steve pouts at her before taking a drink of his coffee.

“Who said I didn’t appreciate you, too?” Natasha winks at him. “Maybe I appreciate the idea of both of you at the same time.”

She gets what she’s after when Steve, predictably, confuses inhaling and swallowing as his brain processes that.

“You’re so easy, Rogers.”

***

It’s late. Sam’s alone in the tiny pool of light cast by the lamp at his desk, poring over sketches that are still on paper—paper is more secure than electronic media these days. At least someone has to hunt him down to get something on paper. He’d hear them coming.

He can’t imagine Hydra being interested in a wingpack, though. Not even an improved version. _We’ll make what we can_ , Coulson had said. _All my old channels are gone, or I’d just contact someone in R &D over at the Air Force_. Exposing Hydra had cost them, cost S.H.I.E.L.D., everything. Sam doesn’t know when he started thinking of himself as part of them, he’s not on their books, but he does.

A knock on the door startles him so that the jerk of his arm knocks his mug off the desk. He catches it before it’s halfway to the floor and cold black coffee sloshes over his hand. Maybe the work with Nat is paying off after all, he thinks, as he dries his hand off on his jeans.

Sam takes his gun from its place at his hip on his way out to answer the door. Nat doesn’t knock, she just says his name.

“Sam?” That’s not her, that’s Steve. Sam holsters the gun with one hand, opens the door with the other.

“Something wrong?” Sam hasn’t seen Steve in weeks. The anxious knot in his chest doesn’t let up once he gets a look at Steve’s face. Steve looks years older, unshaven, hair in disarray. “Something’s wrong.” Sam answers his own question.

“Not…wrong.” Steve shoves a rolled up ballcap into his jacket pocket. “I just needed to talk to you, get your advice on something.”

“You? Needing my advice?” Sam laughs at Steve, then closes the door behind him. “Something is definitely wrong. You wouldn’t be over here for nothing.” He flips on the living room light.

“Yeah, that’s...I’m sorry about that.” Steve shoves his hands into his jeans pockets, stands there in the middle of the living room like he doesn’t know what to do with himself, looking everywhere but at Sam. “I should have, once we found Bucky, I should have come by or something. More. You know.”

“Hey, you had stuff to do, I get it. You want something to drink?” Sam pats Steve on the shoulder on his way past. “Hungry?”

“No. I ate.” Steve doesn’t move. “Sam.”

“Yeah?” Sam does a one-eighty at the kitchen doorway.

“I’m supposed to pick someone. For the serum.” Steve finally looks at him. “I’ve been going through files and I didn’t know if you had any ideas—”

“Nat.” That’s the only person Sam can imagine being right for the job. “She’s already almost as good as you. She has all that training. It’d be a waste to pick someone else.”

“Natasha’s record.” Steve doesn’t need to finish the sentence. Her record is public record now, Sam’s sure Steve’s read it. Steve’s thorough that way.

“Her record is her past.” Sam crosses his arms over his chest, studies Steve’s face. He doesn’t want this to be a point he has to make with Steve, he needs Steve to be better than that. “You know who she is now.”

“Yeah. I just wanted to hear someone else say it, you know?” Steve flashes Sam a smile that makes his chest tight. “Someone I trust.”

“You and I might be the only people in this town with that opinion,” Sam says. “I don’t know. Don’t care. She needs us to have that opinion. Don’t let her down.”

“I won’t.” Steve exhales slowly, then he goes to take a seat on the couch. He moves like his joints are rusted.

“What you think matters to her,” Sam reminds him, and it feels like spilling Nat’s secrets even though she hasn’t been playing her cards close to her chest where Steve’s concerned.

“Not more than what you think,” Steve says, almost challenging him. Sam’s not sure where that’s coming from, the flash in his blue eyes and the lift of his chin.

“Yeah, but she knows what I think.” Sam points a finger at Steve. “You, on the other hand. That shield’s not just for show, man.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Steve leans back as though he’s retreating, conceding the field to Sam. No one does that baffled-puppy look the way Steve does, the little frown and the head tilt—other than actual puppies.

“Exactly what I said. You’re not a guy who wears his heart on his sleeve, Steve, no matter what people like to think.” Sam lets him off the hook, a little. He even heads into the kitchen instead of standing there to read Steve’s face. “You’re carrying that thing around even when you don’t know it. I’m gonna put the coffee on. I’ve got work to do before I sleep.”

“I should go.” The couch creaks as Steve gets up to leave. “I have to meet with Coulson tomorrow.”

“Hey.” Sam puts the empty carafe down, comes out to catch Steve before he’s gone again. Steve stops in the hall, turns back because he’s polite that way. Steve doesn’t just walk out on people. “This choice, whatever you choose, it’ll be the right thing, Steve.”

“How do you know that?” Steve scrubs both hands over his face, then meets Sam’s eyes again.

“Because you’re the one making it, man.” Sam can’t imagine it being any other way. “Because whoever you choose, whoever you trust that much with this thing, they’re gonna do right by you.”

“Even Nat.”

“Especially Nat.”

***

The coordinates Natasha is given aren’t for any S.H.I.E.L.D. facility she knows, which she supposes is the point of a secret facility. The directions take her to the Adler Planetarium, Chicago—not so much secret as unexpected. _The Journey to the Stars_ exhibit is on, according to the inviting banner slung over the entryway.

There’s the Shedd Aquarium and The Field Museum, state-of-the-art science, right here as well. Of course a complex like this draws power, requires high-tech equipment, employs all manner of academic and engineer. Perfect placement, too. Access by land, air, and water. No doubt there’s all manner of tunnels and passages below ground. You could even land a helicarrier on Soldier Field.

Natasha remembers a time she would have been amused by hiding a top-secret facility under a public facility like this, even impressed. Now she’s uncomfortable. She feels as though she’s putting people at risk just walking in here. A bright yellow school bus is unloading a stream of children in neat little school uniforms. Her stomach churns and she’s not sure who she is anymore.

The Planetarium is gorgeous inside, art deco era elegance of the 1930s blended with modern displays. Funded by Stark, of course. An incoming tide of children, piping voices and thumping feet, sweeps toward her.

“Fancy meeting you here.” She’s rescued at the last minute by a familiar hand on the small of her back, a familiar profile in her peripheral vision. “So, you looking for room One-Twelve West?” Sam asks as he steers her clear of the kids and the strange press of guilt and anxiety in her chest.

“I am.” She pushes the hood of her sweatshirt back. He’s wearing a battered old Tilly hat, a patched Army jacket she’s never seen before. He could be any other veteran in Chicago except that she knows that profile. “Did Coulson contact you?”

“He did.” Sam’s obviously been here before, or at least before her. He directs her down a narrow hall half-hidden behind a display on rocket engines. “Far as I can tell, this is us. There is no One-Twelve but this is West.”

There’s a maintenance door with an old electronic lock on it, six silver push buttons gleaming. Natasha presses one, one, two, then tries the knob. Sure enough, it turns and lets them in. It’s a maintenance closet inside, it looks like it would have back when Steve was a kid.

“I hate this,” she mutters as the door closes behind Sam. It’s almost pitch black in here except for the green faux-radium glow of a warning sign painted over the sink on the far wall.

“Yeah, I can think of a few people you’d rather be in here with,” Sam quips. Natasha elbows him in the gut, she knows where he is without thinking about it. “Oof.”

“Shut up, Wilson.” Natasha is sure there’s some kind of pass-through here.

“So. Steve came to see me,” Sam says casually. He’s searching the shelves behind her. “I, uh. I hope you’re not mad I volunteered you for the serum.”

“You what?” Natasha was ready for him to tell her Steve had asked him to take it, which didn’t explain what she was doing here—well, not until now. She spins around and finds herself nose to nose with Sam. It’s actually a very small space.

“He asked me who I thought should get it.” Sam looks uncomfortable, he pulls the hat off and runs a hand over his hair. He and Steve are so much alike sometimes it’s ridiculous. “And I said you. I hope you don’t mind.”

“I don’t… But no one’s going to give it to me,” Natasha hisses. “I’m not… Well, not having this conversation in a closet for one thing.”

“Please stand still,” a laconic voice drifts in. “It’s hard enough scanning one of you at a time without you two doing the mambo in there.”

“Your past is your past.” Sam is so close that Natasha can smell him. He smells warm and sweet and safe. In the dim light, she can just barely make out his features, but she knows his serious voice and she wants him to stop talking because it gets her in places she spends too much time trying to pretend are dead and gone. “Your future, that’s up to you. I have faith in you.”

“I told him to give it to you.” Now Natasha regrets that deeply. In the moment, it had seemed the practical, reasonable thing to do. Now that she’s standing here thinking of Sam—Sam—being made into a weapon, she wants to go back and undo her words. She can’t look him in the face anymore. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?” Sam touches her cheek. “Nat, why?”

The lights come on, cruel and white, and she’s left with the image of his concern burning in her eyes as they adjust. “Watch your elbows,” the voice intones. “Please remain where you are until the platform comes to a complete halt.” Then they’re dropping down a shaft into the depths of the complex.

Things are well-lit down in the depths, sterile and smooth. Steve is waiting for them there. He looks as tired as he usually does these days. Natasha stifles her concern for him—he’s a big boy, he’s a super-soldier, he’ll manage.

“Always another layer, isn’t there?” Sam says as Steve leads them through the halls. They could be anywhere in the world. It’s easy to get turned around in these places but Natasha thinks they’re headed south.

“Always.” Steve stops at a set of doors, on the yellow markings, and waits to be scanned. “That’s why I asked you two to come, instead of people I didn’t already know.”

“Makes sense.” Natasha has to admit that even she’d take herself over an unknown factor. “So, do we flip a coin?”

“If you accept?” Steve ushers them through the doors once they open. “No. S.H.I.E.L.D. wants to start with two subjects.”

“To start.” Sam doesn’t sound any happier than Natasha feels about it.

“To start.” Steve stops at a door with Coulson’s name on the marker, knocks once, then opens the door. His expression is grim. Natasha is just starting to understand what a toll this is taking on him, and why, as she sees the potentials unfolding ahead of her. “After you two.”

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Natasha steps inside.

“Is anyone?” Sam adds.

“No,” Steve said flatly. He closes the door behind them.

“It’s going to happen, though.” Coulson doesn’t even look up from his work. “If it’s not us, it’s only a matter of time before someone works it out from the information out there. We have Stark on our side, which gives us an edge. And the only two living specimens.” He signs something in three consecutive places, then he puts it aside to look at them. “We need all the edges we can get.”

“Yeah, but an army?” Sam looks from Steve to Natasha, then to Coulson. “Man. This isn’t… I don’t know you that well, but. It seems a little too Hydra to make a lot of super-soldiers. Didn’t we just get done deciding that we don’t want to be like Hydra?”

“We did.” Coulson gestures for them to sit down. “But consider the three main advantages of this program: we’re not Hydra; we need to be able to stop them and anyone else like them out there with as few resources and as little loss of life as possible; and what we learn how to do, we’ll learn how to undo. With your help.”

“So. The end game isn’t just to make super-soldiers,” Natasha says slowly. “It’s to make the idea—at least the idea of doing it this way—obsolete.”

“We hope to make it unprofitable for anyone to rely on human weapons, at least the ones made in this manner, yes,” Coulson says, folding his hands on the desk in front of him. “One way or another.”

“How close are you to that?” Sam doesn’t look at Coulson, he checks with Steve. “Because right now this sounds like a pre-emptive move in a new Cold War.”

“Years,” Steve says tightly. “It’s an end-game. Not one I think they’re playing very hard. No offense, Coulson,” he adds quickly. “I know how you feel about what they did to Bucky. I know you have second thoughts—unofficially. But the horse has left the barn on this.”

“A morally ambiguous gambit at best.” Natasha can’t keep the bitterness out of her voice. “I can see why people thought of me.” She looks away before she can see either Steve or Sam wince. “So, when do I start?”

“We’re doing this in two stages.” Coulson takes two folders from a drawer and lays them on the desk. “These are your dossiers, complete with all the consent forms you’ll need to sign. If you’re interested, of course, Mr. Wilson. We can start stage one with Ms. Romanov, if not, while we look for your replacement. Membership with S.H.I.E.L.D. is included. We even have a secret decoder ring.” Natasha can read his anxiety in the bad joke and the tension around his eyes.

“Are you doing this? Really?” Sam asks Natasha, as though it matters to him one way or the other.

“Yes.” Natasha takes the dossier closest to her, then allows herself to look over at him. “You know why. You don’t have to, though, Sam. It’s not—”

“You can take your time deciding,” Steve is saying at the same time.

“I’m in.” Sam grabs the other dossier.

“Excellent. I’ll leave it to you three to decide who goes first,” Coulson says as he gets up. “If you’ll excuse me, I think I’ve been drinking the same cold coffee for the last—” He checks his watch. “—day. I’ll also start the process of assigning you resources.” As he comes around the desk, he offers Sam his hand. “Welcome to S.H.I.E.L.D., for what it’s worth.”

“Thanks, I think.” Sam shakes Coulson’s hand, then Coulson is gone with a nod to Steve and Natasha. The door clicks shut behind him.

“So, who’s going first?” Natasha is flipping through her dossier without seeing anything. The content is functionally irrelevant.

“We haven’t tested the serum on people.” Steve leans against Coulson’s desk, arms crossed over his chest. “We haven’t tested the activation chamber either. So we’re having to do this in two steps. Someone’s going to have to go first knowing that.”

And now it’s all clear. Steve’s tension and exhaustion. He doesn’t just have to ask them to become weapons of the state, he’s asking them to risk their lives on a complete gamble. Something they can’t duck, dodge, or otherwise beat. It’s just them and science and maybe a little superstition alone in some kind of high-tech pressure cooker.

“I’ll do it,” she says. If they lose her, maybe it’ll save someone else.

“No.” Sam’s voice is flat. Unfamiliar. He sounds almost angry. “I’m going first.”

“Why?” Natasha can’t stifle the spike of anger. His resistance feels like a betrayal, as though he doubts her. “There’s no reason—”

“There’s every reason,” Sam snaps. He gestures at Steve. “Tell her. Her skills, her connections, her experience. All of it is priceless. You can’t bottle it or teach it. Lose her, you lose all that.”

“He’s right.” Steve looks like it’s hurting him to say it. “He should go first. I’m sorry, Natasha. You’re a more experienced agent. You’re a better resource.”

 _But he’s Sam_. As though that’s not irreplaceable. _I said I was in first. I’ve got seniority. He’s not even a real agent yet_. All the useless excuses bubble up and choke her.

“You can’t pull some kind of macho bullshit on me,” she spits instead because it’s all she’s really got.

“Natasha, that’s not what this is,” Steve says gently, and that just makes it so much worse, that he’s okay with this somehow—that he’s not going to stop Sam from going first.

“I’m not going to sit by and watch him pull some stupid, heroic self-sacrifice play because it hurts his ego to watch me risk my life.”

“Heroic?” Sam gets up to grab a pen from Coulson’s desk, sending Steve lurching out of his way. “You think this is heroic?” He starts signing angrily, Natasha can hear the paper parting under the pen. “This is me being a coward,” he says between his teeth.

“Sam,” Steve says gently, as though he knows something Natasha doesn’t understand. “You’re not a coward. You’ve never been a coward.” He puts his hand on Sam’s arm to slow him down, to soothe the corded muscles. They’ve always touched so easily. Irrationally, she envies them.

“How the hell is you volunteering to die horribly you being a coward?” Natasha gets up, then snatches the pen out of his hand as he’s flipping pages to find the next dotted line. He can wait for her or find another.

“Because I don’t have to stand there and watch you die knowing I could have done something about it.” Sam shoves the dossier at Steve. “I’ll finish off anything I missed when I get back. I’m gonna go tell Coulson we decided.” He’s out the door before Natasha is finished processing his words.

Something in Natasha’s subconscious understands what Sam’s saying before the rest of her does. She’s catching up to herself when something white interferes with her vision, a tissue being offered. She takes it and dabs water off of the documents she was signing, then finally realizes that the droplets are coming from her. Tears.

“I don’t cry,” she says angrily as she wipes her face. Then, “You can’t let him do this.”

“I don’t trust anyone else to do it.” Steve reaches for her and she lets him draw her in against his chest. He’s a wall against the world, leaning against him is like leaning against a mountain. He has the same permanence about him, seen up close. “Anyone else, I’d be more afraid it would work.”

“I don’t deserve it.” She sounds like a child. She feels like a child, wonders what she doesn’t remember—by choice or by design.

“If that’s what you think, then your math is worse than mine.” Steve kisses her hair, the way Sam did back at the gym, comforting her. “It’s Sam. Did you expect less?”

***

“Do you remember much about it?” Bucky’s leaning against the wall again, so close that Steve could reach out and touch him if they weren’t separated. Steve feels like a voyeur sitting here, as though he should drop in coins to keep a curtain from falling down between them. Instead, he ends up paying in honesty.

“Yes. All of it.”

The way Bucky stands, arm against the glass, forehead against his arm casts his face in shadows as the sunlight washes over him from above. His grin is a flash in the shadow, like lightning striking. He meets Steve’s gaze for the first time all morning and it’s as though, for a moment, they’re connected again.

“Hurts like a bitch, doesn’t it?” Bucky actually laughs. That’s twice now, since they brought him back. “It should, you know. Hurt. Makes me feel better, kind of, that we still have to pay for what we are.”

“Is that what you’re doing now?” Steve realizes he’s drumming his fingers on the back of the chair he’s sitting on, makes himself stop. “Paying?”

“Resting.” Bucky doesn’t seem irritated by the prodding. He’s less volatile lately. “It’s quiet in here. People, they’re like pinpricks. All of them potential targets. And me not wanting to kill any of them. Used to be it was me not wanting to want to kill them. Guess I’m maturing,” he says dryly. “What about you?”

“Maturing?” Steve tilts his head—maybe he has been. He trusts less in some places, more in others.

“Paying.” Bucky turns away, scraping his hair back with both hands, but it’s only to go over to the little desk by his bed. His room here is like a little diorama, or a stage. Props of normalcy. But it seems to make him happy. He finds something in the desk drawer, turns out it’s an elastic, and twists it into his hair. “I’m not the only one behind a wall, Steve. You just carry yours around.”

“I’m not—” Steve starts to say.

“Don’t bullshit me, kid.” Bucky laughs. “You know what you talk about when you come down here? I mean, what you actually care about when you talk about it?”

“Truth, justice, and the American Way?” Steve suggests hopefully.

“You talk about everything except what’s really bugging you. As for what you care about, or who...” Bucky actually grabs his chair from by the desk and drags it over to sit across from Steve, mirroring him, arms folded over the back of the chair. “I might’ve been brainwashed for seventy years, Steve, but I’m no dummy. There’s only one reason you’d have second-thoughts about recommending someone you trust for this serum thing.”

“Bucky.” Steve rubs a hand over his face. Bucky’s right. Now he wishes that wall between them was a little more opaque.

“Hey, I’m not the guy stuck back in the forties when it comes to dating. I mean, I’m glad you caught up to the forties,” Bucky says easily. That’s so familiar it’s painful but Steve can’t help laughing.

“I date. I’ve dated.” Sort of. Almost. Once or twice.

“See, one thing I got really good at when I was working for Hydra? Was putting pieces together. Connections. I was always pretty damn good at reading people.” Bucky looks almost smug. “I watched you. Not just you, all of you. I had my own ideas from observation. When you started talking to me, once I was down here, what I couldn’t work out for a while was why you were stuck.”

“Stuck? What am I stuck on?” Now Steve’s the one on his feet. Pacing.

“Natasha.” Bucky’s always called her the red-head before, it’s strange to hear him put a name to her. “I thought you were just being you—you know, selling yourself short like you do—and that’s why that wasn’t going anywhere. But maybe I was reading it wrong. Maybe you just care about her, like a friend.”

“I do.” Steve’s about to exonerate himself of any other charges, but Bucky holds up a finger.

“But I’m not wrong. Still, maybe you’re more into Sam. And, I’ll be honest. Natasha’s more my type than yours, even though she’s definitely into you. Sam, though. Sam is your type.” Bucky sounds completely certain of that. “He’s got that whole heroic thing down already. Don’t give me any bullshit about you not being into him, either. Me, I wouldn’t kick either—or both—of ‘em out for eating crackers in the bed.”

“Bucky…”

“I’ve got nothing else to do down here but worry about you. Beats remembering. It’s like my own little soap opera. You come down here, you tell me things, I know you so I fill in the stuff you don’t say.” Bucky’s eyes narrow as he studies Steve’s face, which is getting hotter by the second. “Just don’t get so hung up on the way you think a thing should be that you miss what it really is, kid.”

“What it really is?” Steve’s lost, feels as though he should be behind that wall and not Bucky, he’s so confused.

“You didn’t want me in here because you know the person I was. The one you want me to be. That’s not me, Steve.” There’s no regret in Bucky’s voice, but his expression is sad. “You’re so busy looking at what you want me to be, you can’t see what I am. I know what I am. So that’s what I’m saying to you now: about you, about them. See it for what it is.”

***

Steve hasn’t forgotten what Bucky said—can’t get it out of his head, in fact—when he shows up at Sam’s hotel room on Natasha’s orders.

 _Sam’s room. 7pm. Bring beer._ Bring beer. Not order from room service. Not raid the mini bar. Bring beer. That means the usual beer, which means Sam’s beer. Steve knows better than to disobey a direct order.

“Hey.” Sam looks surprised to see Steve. He opens the door, though, and steps back to let Steve in. “Everyone you know trying to kill you again?”

“Not everyone.” Steve can’t help laughing at that.

“You looked cheerier then,” Sam says as he lets the door close behind Steve. “So, what’s up?”

“Nat said to show up with beer.” Steve holds up the offering. “I know to do what I’m told.”

“Guess she got the memo that I’m not supposed to eat or drink anything after noon tomorrow.” Sam takes the case from him. “Looking forward to not being the only one who can open those really tough pickle jars?”

“House calls are cutting into my reading time, yeah.” Steve follows him into the suite. S.H.I.E.L.D. may be a shadow organization now, and reduced to a shadow of its former self, but Coulson still managed to put Sam and Natasha up in some decent accommodations near the complex. Steve’s given up on sleeping and staying at the complex lets him visit Bucky any time he can. “I was expecting Nat to be here.”

“She’s right through there.” Sam nods toward a door across the room. “Or she is when she’s here. Haven’t heard from her yet. You know, they have beer here.”

“I know. But I wasn’t going to argue.” Steve takes the beer Sam offers him. It doesn’t do a damn thing but he still loves the taste. It’s familiar. Human. “Can you imagine what she’ll be like with the serum?”

Sam laughs at him, then cracks his beer open. “Trying to decide what it says about me that all I can think is that it’s gonna be hot.”

“I dunno. You’re breathing?” Steve slides the balcony door open—the view is gorgeous and the evening is cool, the sky over the lake is shades of indigo and lavender.

“True. You were pretty damn cute before the serum,” Sam says, following him out. “I saw your files when I was going over the declassified project notes. And now look at you. I may have to wear a mask or something, so I don’t blind people with my beauty.” He leans on the railing next to Steve and gives him a cheeky grin. “It’s a concern, man. I only want to do good in the world.”

“I know.” Steve’s laughter is caught up with how much he loves that about Sam; that, all joking aside, that’s really what Sam wants. “It’s why you’re perfect.”

“For the project,” Sam amends, waggling his beer bottle at Steve as though chiding him silently.

“No.” Steve wants to kiss Sam so much his chest hurts with it. He can’t quite, something won’t let him, so he brushes the back of one hand against Sam’s cheek instead. “Just in general. Just perfect.”

“That’s saying something, coming from you.”

Sam doesn’t share Steve’s hesitation. Crazy leaps of faith seem to be his thing, wings or not. He kisses Steve, soft and sweet, and it’s as good as Steve ever imagined it would be: a shock that runs straight from his lips to his heart and makes it stand still for the longest time.

“Sorry,” Sam says, as soon as he pulls away. “I should, um, remember to have more than half a beer before doing stupid shit, so I can blame it on the alcohol instead of… me. I know—” He holds up a hand as Steve is trying to make his mouth work for words when it wants to be kissing. “—I know you and Nat are—”

“Steven and I are what?” Natasha is standing in the balcony door, holding a stack of pizza boxes. “ _What_?” She says to whatever expression is on their faces when they turn to look at her. “We’re in Chicago, home of obscenely good pizza. And don’t tell me it’s not pizza, Rogers. It’s pizza. Good pizza. Finish kissing or whatever you’re doing, then get in here and eat.”

“We’re not—” Sam says, at the same that Steve says, “Nat, wait.”

Somehow, in attempting to follow her, they get tangled up in each other. They barely get sorted out in time to make it through the balcony door—on the second try. Natasha puts the pizzas down on the low table between a sofa and two chairs just in time to collapse onto one of the chairs in helpless laughter.

“I hope there’s surveillance cameras in here,” she manages to say. “Because I have to show that to Hill. Super-soldiers my ass.” She’s laughing so hard there are tears in her eyes. “We’re doomed.”

“Excuse me,” Sam says, trying to recover some dignity. “I am not yet a super-soldier. Unlike some people I could mention. Who take up too much of the average doorway with their enormously deformed shoulders.” He smacks Steve on the hip. “Man has the proportions of a Dorito.” That just makes Natasha laugh harder.

“But apparently I’m hot enough for you to make a pass at me after half a beer.” Steve wants an explanation for that. “Enormously deformed…” he mutters before taking a drink. He really misses being able to get drunk which is ridiculous because, when he could get drunk, he hated it.

“What can I say. I love junk food.” Sam shrugs, then gives Steve his most innocent look before finishing off that beer—probably too quickly but it’ll be the last chance he has to get drunk, one way or another.

“So what does that make Nat, then? Cheesecake?” Steve sprawls in the chair across from her, grinning at her suddenly aggrieved expression. “Or pie?”

“Watch it, son.” She takes the beer Sam brings her after getting himself a second. “You’re getting remarkably close to being sent to bed without dessert.”

“Oh, was there a hope of me getting dessert? Because I wasn’t aware of that.” Steve doesn’t look away from her, not until Sam cuffs him in the head. “What?”

“You waiting for her to hand you a menu?” Sam drops onto the couch, then leans forward to flip open the top pizza box. “She’s done everything but show up wearing whipped cream and a cherry.”

“If I did that, he’d think I was on assignment.” Natasha snaps her fingers at Sam. “Gimme a piece of that one. I think it’s the sausage-mushroom deepdish.”

“See?” Sam looks over at Steve as he’s getting the pizza out for her. “She has to resort to going out for sausage. Pitiful.”

“Oh, you’re one to talk, Captain Oblivious. I already got Hill to put an ‘O’ on your new uniform.” Natasha takes the first slice of pizza away from Sam and grabs a napkin from a plastic bag on the floor by the table where she must have dropped it on the way in. “There’s paper plates in there, too,” she adds, tossing the bag onto the table.

 _See it for what it is_. What it is—them. The three of them. _Not what it should be_. Something neat and simple, something familiar.

Steve grabs the bag and opens up the paper plates, sets them out while Sam and Natasha are arguing over whether or not anchovies are a pizza topping or a punishment.

“Eat it.” Natasha has an anchovy she’s taken from the only pizza that has them and she’s holding it by the tail. “Eat. It.” She wiggles it in Sam’s face as he shies away from it like a two-year-old faced with broccoli.

“My last supper and you want me to eat some dried-up bony dead thing?” Sam’s laughing, fending off the anchovy with one hand.

“Hey, five minutes ago you were ready to eat something that got left in the freezer for seventy years.” Natasha pops the anchovy into her mouth, then looks at Steve and wiggles her eyebrows.

“I’m right here, you know,” Steve grumbles. It’s hard to even feign irritation when they’re both laughing like this.

“Now, you held up well for a man who was on ice for most of a century.” Sam winks at him. “I’ve never claimed to be above a little convenience food once in a while. Miss Hypocritical over here’s been living on ramen when she thinks no one’s looking.”

“That’s a terrible thing to say about—” Natasha starts to say, then she stops, wide-eyed. “Oh. You meant the actual noodles.”

“Yeah, not those over-processed artificially-flavoured boys I see you picking up at the gym,” Sam says with an eyeroll. “Some of them are orange,” he adds, looking over at Steve. “Orange.”

“Hey, I can’t talk.” Steve stacks one piece of pizza on top of another, face-to-face, because it’s more efficient that way. “All of my hotness came out of a bottle. So to speak. I’m the original artificial man.” A balled-up napkin hits him in the forehead. “What?” He looks up into Natasha’s scowl.

“Will you tell this asshole what,” she says to Sam, gesturing to Steve with her beer bottle.

“She doesn’t like anyone talking shit about her man,” Sam says. He looks over at Natasha and starts laughing when he gets a good look at her sour expression. “She nearly threw down with some senior agent who said you were overrated—right in the middle of the cafeteria, like, two days ago. Not sure I can forgive Coulson for putting a stop to that one.”

“She’s just jealous because Coulson likes you better than her,” Natasha mutters between vicious bites of pizza. “Overrated, my ass.”

“I’m your man now, am I?” Steve kind of likes the sound of that, it warms him up inside and he knows it’s making his cheeks hot—and he doesn’t care. “So how come Sam’s allowed to talk shit about me?”

“Oh. Hey.” Sam looks smug. “Good question.” He waves half a piece of pizza at her. “How do you explain that one?”

“You’re mine, too.” Natasha shrugs, then reaches for another piece of the anchovy pizza. “You didn’t figure that out already? Either of you? Good thing you’re both pretty.”

Sam takes a bite of pizza, looking thoughtful as he chews, then he looks over at Steve and echoes Natasha’s shrug. “Yeah, okay. I’m good with that,” he says easily. “You?”

“Yeah, I’m good.” Steve really wants to go over there and kiss him, and her, to push away his awareness of how fragile everything is, how this could be the first, last, and only time they sit together like this, like family. “She’s right, we are really pretty. Especially you.”

“I know.” Sam finishes his beer, then holds out the bottle. “So pretty that you’re gonna haul your super-ass up and get me another beer.” He grins at Steve, almost challenging him.

“You just want to watch my super-ass go get you a beer,” Steve accuses. Still, he puts his pizza down and gets up to take Sam’s empty away.

“Damn right I do,” Sam says unapologetically. “Work that thing, make it worth my time.”

Steve looks to see if Natasha needs another and finds her staring up at him, deer-in-headlights.

“I was kidding,” she says carefully, articulating each word as though she’s cutting them out of glass. Still, she hands over her empty bottle.

“I wasn’t.” Steve crouches down by her chair. “See. Serious face.” He checks over at Sam. “You?”

Sam looks from Steve to Natasha, then back again. “I was kidding,” he says, after a moment. “Kind of, but not.” He pauses, then exhales slowly. “No, actually. I wasn’t. And I’m not kidding now.”

“Captain America does not have threesomes,” Natasha points out, still looking wary. Steve knows the only reason she’s hesitant is because it matters—because they matter—to her. Her caution is a declaration of affection she doesn’t even know she’s making.

“The guy turns one hundred in, what, five years?” Sam says laconically. “I say he can do whatever the hell he wants. And I could be dead tomorrow, so there’s nothing stopping me.”

“Don’t say that.” Natasha’s expression shifts, twists into pure outrage. She’s so angry, she takes off one of her shoes and throws it at Sam. “Don’t. Just.” She throws the other one. “Don’t say that.” Sam deflects the first shoe, Steve intercepts the second.

“Hey, hey.” Sam pushes the table out of the way with one foot, then reaches for her as Steve’s scooping her out of her chair with one arm behind her back. The empty bottles roll away across the floor, one under the couch, one under the table. “Nat, c’mere. I’m sorry.” She doesn’t resist being drawn onto the couch and into Sam’s arms, she kisses him fiercely on the mouth as soon as she’s close enough. “I take it back. I’m gonna be okay.”

Steve settles on the couch with them, sliding one arm around Sam’s shoulders. He strokes Natasha’s back with his free hand. She’s taut with distress. “He’s going to be fine, Natasha. I was fine, he’ll be great. I wouldn’t—” He meets Sam’s eyes over her head and his heart clenches. “—I wouldn’t let him do it if it wasn’t safe.”

“That’s complete bullshit,” Natasha spits, tossing her hair back as she twists in Sam’s arms to look at Steve. “And you know it.”

“You’re the worst liar I’ve ever met.” Sam’s voice is slightly unsteady. “You can’t even do that for me? Lie well enough to make me feel better?”

“I’m shit at lying to the people I love,” Steve says helplessly. “I’m sorry. I’m working on it.”

“Don’t.” Natasha grabs him by the shirt collar and pulls him in for a kiss. Her mouth is hot, angry, and she kisses like she’s fighting. “I like you the way you are,” she adds, once she lets him breathe. “Honest and noble and stupid.”

“Can’t improve on perfection anyway,” Sam says quietly. His hand is gentle on Steve’s cheek, guiding him in for another kiss. It’s just as good as the first one, just as sweet and right.

“Thought I told you that you were the perfect one,” Steve kisses Sam’s cheek, then the soft, midnight curve of his neck so Natasha can kiss him on the mouth again.

“I vote yes to that,” Natasha says softly. “Two-thirds majority rules.” There’s such tenderness in her voice—it shouldn’t surprise Steve but he’s not used to hearing her expose herself that way. Steve looks up to see Sam looking at her as though it’s for the first time. “What? Too busy checking out Captain America’s ass to catch me looking at you?”

“Can’t see what you’re not looking for.” Sam’s expression is halfway between sheepish and smitten. “Guess it’s good you’ve got my back.”

“Don’t have any choice if you don’t let me go first,” she points out. Her beautiful mouth is tight with sadness, there’s tension in her neck and shoulders that makes Steve’s chest hurt.

“You’re gonna be mad at me for that forever, aren’t you?” Sam doesn’t sound particularly regretful.

“I’m Russian. We know how to hold a grudge.” She takes Sam’s face in her hands, then kisses him on the mouth until he’s breathless from it. “So don’t go dying just to get out of it.”

“As long as you stick around, you can be as mad as you like, baby.” Sam laughs at her as he reaches up to tuck her hair back behind her ears. “It’s a price I’m willing to pay.”

“That may come back to bite you on the ass one day,” Steve warns, knowing damn well Sam doesn’t care—he wouldn’t, either.

“You know what’s gonna bite you on the ass?” Sam looks him over with a particular expression Steve hasn’t seen before.

“What?” Steve checks around, uncertain as to what he’s missed. He looks to Natasha but she’s dissolved into laughter with her head on Sam’s chest—he thinks he hears an ‘oh, my God’ from her. “What?!”

“Me.” Sam points at himself, laughing. “I will be biting you on the ass. Every chance I get.”

“...oh.” That’s what that expression means. No wonder Steve hasn’t seen it before.

“It’s hard to do with your clothes on, though,” Natasha points out, recovering enough to take charge for the moment. “You should fix that.”

“Guess it’s time for dessert.” Steve gets up to oblige and is rewarded by the way Sam’s eyebrows shoot up. “What, you thought I’d punk out?” He laughs at Sam’s little ‘well, maybe’ shrug. “I already told you I love you. That’s the hard part. This is only me taking my clothes off. I do that at least twice a day.”

“There is nothing ‘only’ about you taking your clothes off.” Sam gestures for him to get on with it. “Get naked, man. Give me something to live for.”

***

Not how Sam had expected that evening to go. Not even close. Pizza. Beer. His best friends. Yes, all that. Him making an ass of himself over one or both of them—even that he’d anticipated.

Not this. Not lying here at three in the morning with his body molded to the curve of Steve’s, Steve’s chest against his back and one of Steve’s arms tucked under his head like a pillow, Steve’s other arm around his waist holding him tight. Not lying here with his hands tangled with Nat’s, her nose touching his, her knees bumping against his, him holding onto her like he’s afraid she’s going to float away from him.

Steve is sound asleep, it took both of them to wear him out and Sam admits it was a pretty close thing because he’s almost tired enough to sleep in spite of his anxiety about what’s coming. Nat’s awake, though, he can see the green glitter of her eyes in the light creeping around the seams of the bathroom door. Sam brings one of her hands to his mouth, kisses her knuckles.

“So, you’ve been holding out on me how long?” he teases gently.

“Oh. You know.” She kisses his hand in return, they’re that close she doesn’t have to move to do it. “Since hello.”

“You must have been a hell of a spy.” Sam lets her hand go but it’s only to slide his hand around to the small of her back, the most beautiful curve on her.

He’s obsessed with it now because it’s so smooth and graceful and secret; because of the way it deepens when Nat’s riding Steve and skirting the edge of orgasm so that she wins the game of making him come first. Neither of them are stupid enough to just let her win, she’d know. But losing is never so good as when it’s losing to her—especially when it means Sam can go down on her after and taste them both as he gets her off. He’s got reasons to live for he didn’t let himself dream of before tonight.

“Why’s that?” Nat kisses him on the mouth this time, shifting closer.

“I didn’t have a damn clue,” Sam confesses. He draws her as close as he can, lets his hand slip down her thigh to the warm, damp crook of her knee, and then brings her leg up over his and Steve’s. That’s better. Her soft breasts are brushing his chest now; she strokes his cheek, then reaches beyond him to feather her fingers through Steve’s hair as he murmurs in his sleep and hugs Sam a little tighter.

“You two were so into each other. I didn’t want to interfere,” she says softly. She sounds almost shy about it.

“I wouldn’t call tonight interfering,” Sam says, nuzzling her nose with his own. “We’re not us if we don’t have you—us is all three of us. Don’t know how Steve figured that out first, but there you go.”

“He really loves you.” Nat sounds kind of wondering about it.

“And you.” Sam kisses her again.

“And me.” She sniffles unexpectedly. “I hate both of you more than I can say.”

“Thought you signed away your feelings back in assassin school?” Sam’s not really joking about that, even if his tone is light.

“Basically.” Nat nods, then rolls away from him to sprawl across the pillows, face turned toward the windows and a narrow sliver of night visible between the curtains. The ambient light picks out the line of her profile and the rise of her breasts. The hollow of her throat and the dip of her belly are marked by the darkness pooling there. “I don’t deserve—”

Sam reaches out and lays his thumb against her lips, fits his fingers to the angle of her jaw. “Don’t finish that sentence, baby. No lies in bed.”

Nat lies there for a long moment, then she kisses his thumb before she takes his hand in both of hers, cradles it as though it’s something precious, kisses his palm hot and open-mouthed. Then she presses it to the cool plateau of her breastbone, holds it there, still staring at the ceiling.

“I love you,” she says at last, still not looking at him. “I’m not going to stay mad at you, not even if you’re okay after tomorrow. Not even if we live a hundred more years. Life’s too short for that, no matter how long it is.”

“Thank you.” Sam’s back is chilled when he pulls away from Steve to kiss her on the mouth. “Can’t have my girl mad at me forever. Even if I deserve it.”

“Shut up.” Nat kisses him back fiercely. “No lies in bed. The only thing you deserve is what makes you happy, no matter what it is. If that’s me, if that’s him, if that’s us—you should have it,” she whispers against his lips. “You keep talking like you’re no one and you’re the most important person I know, Sam.”

“Why’s that?” Sam leans over her, strokes her tangled hair.

“Because you make me feel like I could be good again some day,” she says, like it’s some secret no one else can know. “Sometimes you make me feel like I’m good right now. You need to get your wings back because I don’t know anyone who can wear them better. Understand?”

“I understand,” he says solemnly, instead of pushing away the compliment. No. From anyone else it would be a compliment. From Nat it’s so much more, so much bigger even than being asked to take the serum and become a hero, save the world. “I love you, too, Nat. I have faith in you, I always will.”

“I know.” She kisses him again, tenderly this time. “That’s why you’re important, Sam. You believe people are worth saving.”

“It helps that y’all keep proving me right.” Sam gathers her up to bring her with him as he settles into the warmth and shelter of Steve’s body. Nat lets him, curling up on his chest, and he lies on his back with his head pillowed on Steve’s big arm and Steve’s soft breath on his hair. Steve wraps his other arm around both of them with a contented sigh.

“At least this one won’t ever let us down,” Nat murmurs with some amusement. “In or out of bed. Not sure I’m looking forward to the wait between your serum and mine.”

“Oh, the tragedy.” Sam smacks her ass as hard as the limited space under the covers will allow. “A week of nothing to do but lie around in bed between two hot men with superhuman stamina. However will you cope?”

“Cold packs,” she says, giggling. “Possibly reinforcements. Agent May might be cranky but she’s pretty hot.”

“Agent May is scary,” Steve mumbles in Sam’s ear. He’s sleeping but he’s still alert for any danger.

“Shh. See, you woke the baby,” Sam hisses, and Nat laughs harder. “Go to sleep before you cause more trouble, woman. He’s right, though. How’m I supposed to sleep now with that hanging over my head?”

“I’ll just keep her for myself then,” Nat manages to say between bouts of giggles. “If she’s too much woman for you cowardly boys.”

“Still not helping me sleep,” Sam says into her hair as he cuddles her against him. “Love you anyway. Both of you.”

“You better,” Nat mutters, but she softens it with a kiss under his jaw. She’s so tiny, she fits perfectly into the space left by his body and Steve’s. They work together, they have since they met. It may not be the way people do things but it’s right—it’s theirs.

***

Sam rouses too soon, but later than he expected. He smells coffee, which is an incentive to wake up all the way. Natasha has slipped away from him in the night to sleep in a tight knot of white limbs and tangled white sheets, like a pearl. His fingertips, as he’s reaching out for her, are just skimming her back when she breathes.

She’s like that in her waking life, too, going far enough away to feel safely alone but not so far she can’t get home. Sam doesn’t want her to go farther, where he can’t reach her at all, so he lets her have her space. He’s alone on the other side of him, which doesn’t surprise him either. He rolls out of bed that way and pulls on a bathrobe left slung over the back of the couch.

The balcony door is open and Steve’s sitting out there, watching the light creep over the lake, feet up on the rail. He’s dressed in a robe that matches Sam’s; it’s barely held closed at the middle by the belt, falling open to bare his legs high up his thighs and his chest almost all the way to the belt. Wordlessly, Steve offers Sam the cup of coffee he’s been drinking. It’s still hot, must be fresh.

“Thanks.” Sam takes a drink, savouring the moment: the cool of the air, the colour of the sky, the ache of his body, the heat of the coffee. When he looks back, he catches Steve looking up at him. “What?”

“Just happy to be here.” Steve holds out a hand. “Happier now.”

The chair is sturdy enough to hold them both. Sam takes Steve’s hand, steps over him to sit across his lap. He can’t see the view now, but he’s seen it. He’d rather look at Steve. “You okay?”

“Better by the minute.” Steve slides his hands up Sam’s thighs, watching as though he’s hypnotized. “Yeah, good,” he says almost absently, stopping just before he pushes Sam’s robe open entirely to look up at him. “You?”

“Happy.” Sam takes a drink of coffee, basking in Steve’s expression. “Life is good. Still not sure it’s _mine_ but I’m happy to be living it.”

“It’s yours. You’ve earned it.” Steve reaches up to touch Sam’s cheek, then meets him halfway for a coffee-flavoured morning kiss. “If anyone else is supposed to be here instead—it’s you I want. You need me to pinch you, make sure you’re not dreaming?” He slips his hands up under Sam’s robe to grope his ass—getting felt up by Captain America is definitely not in Sam’s definition of reality.

“I could use a little something,” Sam slides his free hand into Steve’s hair to hold him still while Sam kisses him again. Steve yields so easily, he’s so open and so gentle, so stable. Nat is full of fight and flight, Steve is a monument more sturdy than anything that’s been built to honour him. “Yeah. That feels pretty damn real.” Sam puts the cup of coffee aside on the table without looking; he assumes it got there because he doesn’t hear it break while he’s kissing Steve again. “What about you? What do you need?”

“You. Just you.” Getting Steve to sound breathless like that is heaven. “I do, you know.” Steve pulls back enough to look Sam in the eyes. He’s unbelievably gorgeous when he’s flushed and dishevelled, golden hair in disarray and pink staining his skin from his cheeks down to his chest. “Need you.”

“Hey, you got me.” Sam kisses him again, more gently this time. “I’m not going anywhere. I’m gonna be fine.”

“What’s good in my life is almost all because of you. And don’t argue with me because I already did the math.” Steve frowns at him and Sam has to laugh because, yeah, he was about to try working out where Steve was wrong, to push that truth away. “I don’t want you getting hurt but that’s not the only reason I didn’t put your name forward from the start, yours and Nat’s. I wasn’t sure I was thinking clearly.”

“Well. We are dizzyingly attractive.” Sam runs a hand over his hair. “I’ve been looking damn fine lately.”

“That’s not what I mean, even if it’s true.” Steve rolls his eyes, laughing helplessly. “No, I mean, this is what I want. You, me, Nat—Bucky, when he’s ready—out here doing our jobs. Everything I have, I want you two to have. I want to know you’ll be here for a long time. It’s not noble or good or rational. That’s why I spent weeks looking for someone better for the job. Because I wanted it to be you two so badly, Sam.”

“It’s good you’re pretty.” Sam grabs Steve by the front of the robe and pulls him in for a kiss, just a tender one. “Because I swear you’ve got a little frostbite of the brain or something.”

“I second that.” Nat looks like a painting in the morning light, standing there in the doorway in nothing but a sheet tucked and folded into something that covers her—mostly. She yawns as she glides over to claim the coffee for herself, then she deigns to kiss Sam, then Steve, before perching on the balcony table. “You have to trust us about this stuff.”

“We would have told you if you were full of shit.” Sam pushes Steve’s hair back from his forehead—it’s always falling in his eyes.

“Definitely full of shit on this one,” Nat says dryly. “Did you ever think that the reason we’re so good together is because… we’re so good together?”

It takes Sam a moment to catch up to her, then he looks over at Steve, who’s still working on it. “She means we wouldn’t be naked right now if we weren’t so good at the whole hero thing as well,” he offers, just to speed up the process.

“I guess?” Steve looks from Nat to Sam, then back again.

“Yeah, I had something more romantic and psychological in mind.” Nat rolls her eyes at Sam. “Maybe something about destiny and soulmates in there as well. But thanks for summing it up in that completely unsexy way.”

“Okay, but I understood it,” Steve says helpfully. “So, mission accomplished.”

“See.” Sam gestures between the three of them. “We get the job done. Even if it’s not pretty.” He leans over to steal a kiss from Nat. “Which is okay because we are full up on pretty around here.”

“I’m sure we’re way over our pretty quota.” Nat gives him the kiss he’s after, then strokes his cheek as she pulls away. Her expression is breathtakingly affectionate. “I’m considering a scar or something to make us more tolerable. Maybe we should get matching ones.”

“Don’t think that’s going to help much,” Steve says. When Sam looks over, Steve’s watching them with an expression that can only be described as smitten. “You two are pretty all the way down to the bone. I’ve seen the scans,” he adds, winking at Nat as she rolls her eyes at him.

“Ugh, you’re terrible. I’m ordering room service. We’re having pancakes.” Nat hops down off the table, coffee in one hand, the hem of her sheet in the other. “And that’s the extent of the cooking I’m contributing to this relationship,” she says as she makes a mostly-dignified exit. “My cleaning is limited to weapons and hanging out the sign for the maid.”

“I’ll cook.” Sam raises his hand. He’s had Nat’s cooking—he’s sure she could go undercover as a chef but he doesn’t even trust her to make mac and cheese if she’s off-duty.

“I’ll clean.” Steve puts up his hand as well.

“Naked, right?” Nat pokes her head out again, then takes a drink of coffee. “You two said you were going to do that naked, I’m pretty sure I heard that but I was inside.”

“I said no such thing,” Sam protests as Steve’s saying, “Only when we don’t have company.”

“I’ll take it.” Nat disappears inside again.

“Whoa, whoa, what?” Sam was pretty sure Steve was going to be on board with the ‘no doing chores naked’ thing.

“Chances of anyone doing housework if one or more of us is naked?” Steve gives him an arch look.

“I see what you did there.” Sam kisses him, laughing. “You’re not just another pretty face, then.” He gets up, then offers Steve his hand. “Come on, I want to shower before breakfast.”

“I have good ideas once in a while.” Steve lets Sam help him up before pulling him in for a kiss. His bare skin is warm against Sam’s where their robes have fallen open—naked does have its appeal. “Like me helping you take a shower.”

“I like that idea.” Sam backs up slowly, leading Steve inside with one kiss after another. “Tell me more of your good ideas.”

“How about I show you?” Steve’s grin is positively wicked.

***

02:49. The procedure is set for three in the morning.

“Were you scared?” Sam peels his shirt off and hands it to Steve. This isn’t the forties, he has to go through a clean-room procedure, the serum and activation will be done in a closed environment.

“I had less to lose.” Steve takes Sam’s shirt and stands there, holding it just a little too long, before he reluctantly sets it in the bag that’s there for Sam’s personal effects. “Wasn’t as nervous then as I am now, I’ll tell you that.”

“Can’t wait for it to be my turn.” Nat picks up Sam’s shoes and shoves them in the bag with sharp, angry motions. “So you can experience exactly how much this sucks.”

“Reconsidering being mad at me forever?” Sam skins out of his jeans and underwear all at once, hands them over to Steve while he takes off his watch.

“No.” Nat’s lips are pale, all of her is washed out and tired, and it’s not that they didn’t sleep much last night or even from the wearing day spent going over scans and tests. “Not yet anyway.” Finally, she looks at Sam as she comes over to kiss him hard on the mouth. “I’ll see you after.”

“Not if I see you first.” Sam kisses her forehead. He loves her more for how angry she gets when she’s scared. “Love you, Nat.”

“Yeah, well, you better.” She shakes her hair back, then looks him over one more time. “I love you, too. Always.” With that, she turns on her heel and leaves the room so without looking back.

“You look after her.” Sam hands his watch over to Steve, then Steve puts it in the bag with the rest of his things. Chances are, most of it won’t fit when he’s done. Steve seals the bag and sets it aside.

“I will, as much as she’ll let me.” Steve kisses him then, so shamelessly and suddenly that he nearly takes Sam off his feet. They’re hardly in private, there’s cameras and windows and Sam realizes he doesn’t care. Privacy is over for him anyway, the way it was over for Steve. Sam tangles his hands in Steve’s hair and kisses him back just as recklessly. “You’re not replaceable,” Steve murmurs, as he lets Sam go.

“Be back in a minute,” Sam says. “Promise. You won’t even know I’m gone.”

“I’ll tell you I love you when you get back, then.” Steve gives Sam a smile that warms him up, even though Sam can’t miss the tension in him.

“I’ll think of something snappier than ‘I love you, too’, while I’m waiting for them to make me into a superhero.” Sam heads for the doors to the clean showers before someone can come and get him. “You know,” he says, stepping into the airlock area. “You’d think they’d have something better than that by now.”

“Hey.” Steve’s just audible above the swish of the doors opening behind Sam. “Can’t beat the classics.”

***

Steve described it as discomfort. Sam said it wasn’t fun. Days after her remaking, Natasha still feels it in her bones. She was unmade once before, this was no less painful but so much more rewarding. She skips the elevators down entirely, even skips the stairs in favour of dropping down the gap in the spiral of the staircase, three stories, to land on the lowest level.

At the checkpoint, she lets the scans ripple over her, then the lights change to green, and something chimes as the security doors slide back. Second hall on the right. There used to be a glass-steel wall here but it’s gone now. Bucky’s sitting on his bed, buckling his boots.

“You about done living down here?” She’s getting tired of coming down to get him, even though she understands why he’s doing it.

“Probably,” he says, after a moment’s thought. His long hair is pulled back in a barely adequate braid. “I tried,” he says, obviously aware of her critical inspection.

“I’ll fix it in the plane,” she says as she drops his weapons bag and slides it toward him with her foot. He scoops it up as though it weighs next to nothing—for them, it does. “Come on, the boys are waiting.”

“Where are we going in a plane?” He follows her back the way she came in.

“Hawai’i.” Natasha hands him a datapad, then checks her phone for any messages. “Top secret flight, which means we get to enjoy the trip down in a cargo plane with a lot of MREs and medical gear. And then outer space, and we better not just get strapped to some Cold War era rocket. There’s short on funds and then there’s just insulting.”

“So I wasn’t dreaming about the Hydra moon base?” Bucky ignores the mission brief in favour of looking over her shoulder.

“No, it’s there and it’s operative. Hey!” She covers up the screen.

“I don’t think photos of your boyfriends making out by our plane are proper use of S.H.I.E.L.D. property.” Bucky snickers as he elbows her in the ribs.

“Shut up, tin man.” Natasha smacks him in the belly—a little harder than she meant to because she hears the air go out of him. Still not quite used to that. “We’re all S.H.I.E.L.D. property. My improper uses of it would make what’s left of Coulson’s hair fall out.”

“That’s why Fury was bald, then?” This time, Bucky does take a look at the mission. “Dealing with you?”

“Enjoy that ponytail while you have it.” Natasha isn’t even sorry. “Seriously, though, I’m starting to feel like Orpheus. You could at least move upstairs. What are you afraid of? Yourself?” She steps off the elevator ahead of him and leads the way to the hangars.

“Something like that.” Bucky tucks the datapad away so he can keep up with her.

Natasha’s not much taller than she was but she forgets how fast she moves now. Somehow she can’t quite get the hang of the boys’ almost languid way of moving. Sam calls her a hummingbird.

“You know I’ll kill you dead if you make so much as one wrong move,” she reminds Bucky as she holds the door open for him to go outside ahead of her.

“I do. Thanks.” Bucky’s grin is charming, genuine. “So, if I come back to the land of the living where am I going to live?”

Natasha steps out into the sunlight. Steve and Sam are waiting by the plane—Sam’s probably reviewing their flight plans, Steve’s looking over Sam’s shoulder with his arms wrapped around Sam’s waist.

“We’re still looking for a place,” she says. Steve looks up, his face lights up, when he sees them coming. Sam glances up at them, then back at Steve, before shaking his head slightly, smiling. “If you think Steve isn’t making sure we have a spare room in case you want it, maybe your memory’s worse than you know.”

“Well,” Bucky says, handing over his weapons bag to Steve. “As long as I’m not going to break up the band or anything.”

“The what?” Sam frowns, looking from Natasha to Bucky to Steve. “We’re a band now? Are we going undercover?”

“He means if he moves out of purgatory and in with us.” Natasha shoves Steve to get him to board the plane. He looks baffled but hopeful, a bit like a golden retriever puppy catching sight of a tennis ball. “Get your ass on board, Captain America. Tell Bucky he’s not going to break up the band, Sam.”

“Break up the band? Not a chance.” Sam slaps Bucky on the good shoulder, then points for him to follow Steve. “You’re one of the original members. Get your ass on the plane. How are you at laundry?”

“Pretty… good?” Bucky lets Steve help him up and into the back of the cargo plane. “Why?”

“I’ll explain on the way,” Steve says. “Don’t let Natasha tell you that you have to do it naked. She will try.”

“I hate laundry.” Natasha says, leaning up to kiss Sam before she gets on board as well. He looks damn good in his new uniform, even without the wingpack. “But I love you—even more for finding someone to do it.”

“All part of the superhero package,” Sam says, before he kisses her back. “Righting wrongs large and small, any time of day or night.”

“Shut up,” she says, rolling her eyes at him. “You did that before.”

“I did, did I?” Sam’s grin is still the same, irresistibly cheeky.

“You want me to say it?” Natasha laughs at him and that grin.

“Well, if you don’t want to…” Sam lets go of her and holds his hands up. “You know, I can’t make you.”

“Get on the plane, Wilson.” Natasha pushes him that way, still laughing. He’s a little bigger than he was, but she’s stronger than she used to be. “We have an evil superpower to defeat. You were always my hero, okay?”

She follows him on board and buckles him between him and Steve, her favourite place in the world. Sam kisses her hair before he buckles in as well. Natasha sneaks her hand over as the engines roar to life and he takes it, kisses her knuckles.

“Right back at you, Nat,” Sam says. She looks up at him with surprise and there’s no teasing in his expression, even though he’s smiling. “What? We were always heroes, somewhere inside us. All of us. We came this way before anything else happened—you said it yourself: it’s why we’re together.”

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Natural Selection [Podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3211706) by [blackglass](https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackglass/pseuds/blackglass)




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